Split from forum software upgrade (closed)
- Thread starter Mage
- Start date
- Status
X-SOLDIER
Harbinger O Great Justice
- AKA
- X
Mage
She/They
- AKA
- Mage
Yes, I saw your reply and didn't feel like it fitted which is why I asked the fucking question. If new members want to speak to community bods then the FAQ and new members information should have that covered as to who to approach. Existing site staff and contributors are far more pertinent than former staffers for the simple reason that THEY'RE NOT FUCKING STAFF. You're putting an onus on the title that was never there.
ForceStealer
Double Growth
I don't think we need the Staff Emeritus title either, wouldn't mind losing it. But I don't see the need to be that aggressive, Mage.
Cthulhu
Administrator
- AKA
- Yop
It's pointless / a vanity title, I agree with that, but I see it as a way of giving thanks and recognition for those that volunteered their time and effort for an x amount of time to TLS. I guess there's other ways to do that, I'm open for suggestions. Else we can just get rid of it, or idk, maybe replace it with a 'free' donator status for those people? Off course, most staff emeritae (?) are also donators so idk.
Mage
She/They
- AKA
- Mage
I'm getting mighty pissed off with valid queries being shut down like that (quotes rather than an actual reply). It feels like I'm being shushed/dismissed and I'm not a fucking ten year old. Coming from a staffer it's a shitty thing to do.
ForceStealer
Double Growth
He might have just thought you didn't see it, though. It was a new page and without a quote or directly referencing it. But very well
Lex
Administrator
I was thinking we could have small icons to represent some things on XF rather than people having like 50 titles, keeps the postbit looking clean. I know XF can support it but it might require some thrifty CSS and/ or an addon. So for example an icon for donators and an icon for staff emeritus, that we can decide on and create with a nice TLS style.
We could go full throttle with that and get rid of all titles (staff titles like Admin and Mod included), with just a small icon either at the top of the postbit or just under the avatar. That or staff have different coloured user titles or something. Idk obviously all of this is just an idea but our postbits are so gd ugly with all the unnecessary text I'd really like to work on making the new board more visually homogeneous and appealing to read. I think it's important that staff (mods/ admin) are identifiable for if people need to talk to someone on staff, but there's the user list for that aswell.
This is absolutely not the case, what makes you say that?
Mage
She/They
- AKA
- Mage
Because it seems pretty fucking sudden that we've gone from Discord to buying the XF licence and it's not like there was much discussion, not like there was last year when things started moving again. It was like a few people went 'XF is neat' and a few more people agreed and then suddenly we had it. No polls or anything. Darth actually said he didn't give any input because he doesn't know much of the technical side of things, but no-one should feel like their opinion isn't valid and yet there you have it and I don't know why I'm the only person who picked up on this, that alone has got me concerned.
IMO this should have been handled differently, like:
-Okay we're fucking off Discord, it's a colossus of overthought-out code with a shit UI
-That's cool (shame about the time sink but you gotta go there to come back an' shit), what's the alternatives?
-Well there's XF, also [insert alternatives], here's some pros and cons
-Seems reasonable, let's see what the community think
-*goes to poll*
-??????
-most popular option goes to beta stage
This just feels like it's been entirely decided by staff and a few tech bods.
IMO this should have been handled differently, like:
-Okay we're fucking off Discord, it's a colossus of overthought-out code with a shit UI
-That's cool (shame about the time sink but you gotta go there to come back an' shit), what's the alternatives?
-Well there's XF, also [insert alternatives], here's some pros and cons
-Seems reasonable, let's see what the community think
-*goes to poll*
-??????
-most popular option goes to beta stage
This just feels like it's been entirely decided by staff and a few tech bods.
X-SOLDIER
Harbinger O Great Justice
- AKA
- X
Everything that you asked about the Staff Emeritus, had already been spelled out in my previous response though, Mage.
I said that it, "helps to point to some folk who know what they're about in the community a tad bit differently from the Donators." Yes, Donators get special perms, but people who used to be Staff have a knowledge of how this particular forum runs differently than other members, even Donators, do. So there's still some value in signifying that distinction – even if it doesn't come with access to some special sub-forum or whatnot, it's useful to know for someone, especially for new users.
Because it doesn't necessarily need to be a permission's-based usergroup like it is in vB, that's why I also said, "Whether that's a usergroup, or something else I dunno, but I think that it's a valuable distinction." – Hence why I just quoted and monster'd my own earlier reply to yours. You didn't make any specific reference to the values of that role that I pointed out, so it seemed like you just missed it in the sea of replies. I don't know what else needed clarification that I hadn't added already since you didn't seem to make reference to the benefit I mentioned, so it didn't make any sense to type out a whole new response of completely redundant information.
Also, the reason that things moved quickly is that we basically reached a point where we wanted to push into using Discord – we got feedback that it was shit and folk didn't like it. There was quite a bit of hesitation around doing it. We pushed back into looking through the extant options again, and because of previous conversations higher versions of vB were heavily weighed against despite being easy, and XF still felt like the current boards, and everyone with misgivings about Discord had none about XF. Additionally, XF looked technically easier to achieve.
I feel that we're all kind of tired of having this migration having sat about in various stages of development hell, so when the clear answer was to give XF a go, and the test forum went through exceptionally smoothly, it seemed like a no-brainer. If Discord was at all this straightforward, we'd've likely moved already, but thankfully it wasn't so that we found ourselves a better option.
It's not like the staff are unilaterally making decisions without the input of the forum, or things'd've been forced over to Discord regardless of the misgivings of other members when it was brought up. The whole conversation happened at all, because folks felt (rightly) that that move'd be a bit shit, and with XF looking miles better, it's able to be done in relatively short order. Is your issue with actually moving to XF, that it seems to be going (too) quickly, or what? Also, what's the actual NEGATIVE of how quickly this transition's been taking place if so? For once it feels like we've actually all got our shit together towards getting a much-needed upgrade actually happening, so I'm genuinely baffled at all this.
X
Geostigma
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- gabe
Literally all of that happened in this thread. You even replied while that conversation was happening...
I see a few pages back you alluded to this same issue your having but when given the chance to make your case and expound on the idea you chose to make a one word reply.
Furthermore what other choice is there? Discourse is trash, vB5 is not that great and like all of the other alternatives are like free software that has been on life support since 2006. It's not like we have many options to present the community here.
If this was just the staff saying no u without the help of the community chiming in. Sure I would see what you mean about staff just taking their own way, but that couldn't be further than the truth. Even before the public beta test there was still like 20 of the community members testing it behind closed doors. If that doesn't scream community acceptance I don't know what does.
Also want to point out Discourse is so shit you all already forgot its actual name
Flare
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- Flare
Also want to point out Discourse is so shit you all already forgot its actual name
Wait so are Mage and X referring to Discourse here instead of Discord? I was reading through and feeling quite confused, I know I've been absent a while but I was wondering when I'd missed talk of moving entirely to Discord, which was kinda blowing my mind as to why it had been considered.
But if it's Discourse, than this makes a lot more sense and thanks for clearing that up. In general I'm still a bit confused as to why so much thought and work was put into Discourse and progress was slow and then XF was put forth, Discourse abandoned, and XF progress went so quickly. I think it's awesome that there's progress being made and it seems like a move is imminent now but it feels like a big 180 from before and I'm just puzzled what happened to make it so. Then again I confess as to not reading every post in this thread so I'm likely just being stupid and these questions are already answered
fancy
pants
- AKA
- Fancy
^
On the previous episode of Forum Update Z
Discourse was pretty much ready for use but then folks were like, “This whole thing is really kinda shit tbh wtf.
And so folks were like, “Well, do you wanna give XF a go? It’s kinda a sexier version of what we already have.”
And then there were talks of pros and cons of Discourse vs vB vs XF and more and more folks were agreeing that the move to XF made the most sense.
BUT THEN!!!
There was a moral conflict!
“What about all the hard work that was put into Discourse tho?? Shouldn’t we give it a fair chance given the blood, sweat, and tears that went into it??” And Flint was brought up.
BUT THEN!!!
Flint made a Special Guest Appearance and said, “Nah bruh, it’s coo, ain’t no thang but a chicken wang, son.”
And then folks got excited about the thing.
And Yop got a hard-on when he was poking around the thing.
And then Lex went to Discord and shite and got folks to test XF so The Admins With The Know-How could begin tweaking our new home and members testing this shit also got their ‘ons’ very hard.
And I think it’s mostly been a positive, chill experience.
- f f
On the previous episode of Forum Update Z
Discourse was pretty much ready for use but then folks were like, “This whole thing is really kinda shit tbh wtf.
And so folks were like, “Well, do you wanna give XF a go? It’s kinda a sexier version of what we already have.”
And then there were talks of pros and cons of Discourse vs vB vs XF and more and more folks were agreeing that the move to XF made the most sense.
BUT THEN!!!
There was a moral conflict!
“What about all the hard work that was put into Discourse tho?? Shouldn’t we give it a fair chance given the blood, sweat, and tears that went into it??” And Flint was brought up.
BUT THEN!!!
Flint made a Special Guest Appearance and said, “Nah bruh, it’s coo, ain’t no thang but a chicken wang, son.”
And then folks got excited about the thing.
And Yop got a hard-on when he was poking around the thing.
And then Lex went to Discord and shite and got folks to test XF so The Admins With The Know-How could begin tweaking our new home and members testing this shit also got their ‘ons’ very hard.
And I think it’s mostly been a positive, chill experience.
- f f
Geostigma
Pro Adventurer
- AKA
- gabe
I think it's a testament to how much of a pain in the ass Discourse is to actually work with. It took A LOT of work and time to get it to the point it was left at.
Meanwhile Xenforo is apparently so easy to work (apparently minus a few items hidden deep in seemingly unrelated menus) with that Lex was able to make an imo (sorry Flint) better looking and feeling forum with the built in page editor with in hours.
It's not really that XF suddenly has a whole ton of community man hours put into it, I'm pretty sure it actually has barely a fraction of that time compared to Discourse. It just is way more friendly in basically every department.
edit:
Ninjad by Fancy by 2 minutes. Ninja'ing wouldn't be a thing anymore if we were on the new forums
JechtShotMK9
The Sublimely Magnificent One
- AKA
- Kamiccolo9
It seems to me that the people who pay for and run the site should have the say on what decisions to make concerning it. Ultimately, the new forum is more or less a cosmetic upgrade, with some new shiny stuffs thrown in. It's not like they're changing user content or anything.
As for "not listening to use feedback," well....maybe there would be more listening if there was more feedback. This thread has been here for years, yet it's more or less the same people posting in it. It seems to me that's a tacit "whatever, go ahead" from the general forum base.
As for "not listening to use feedback," well....maybe there would be more listening if there was more feedback. This thread has been here for years, yet it's more or less the same people posting in it. It seems to me that's a tacit "whatever, go ahead" from the general forum base.
Claymore
3x3 Eyes
*praises Jecht*
Seriously. I remember trying to jog things along in this thread so many times, get people to post, get feedback on both the frontpage and the forum change, and it was like watching paint dry. It was excruciatingly painful. Announcements were eventually made, test stuff were organised, but it was only a handful of people helping out. Back into development hell it went. It's so depressing and I'm so over it now. Gaining a clear consensus on anything is difficult in itself - especially when people are not even engaging.
As much as I'm for the hippy-commune aspect, there also comes a time when Staff have to - you know - do their jobs and put their foot down and actually do stuff. If this thread proves anything, it's that not every single little thing can, or should, be done by consensus.
Lex
Administrator
All of this discussion happened a long time ago though, that's the thing. It was pretty much universally agreed that XF was the best option a long time ago in terms of being like what we have now, but it was decided against because it cost money. Which is why I was so gung-ho about paying for the license now, my thinking being 1. I owe something to TLS and 2. If I removed the monetary concern, what would stop us from getting the best option? So I did. For the record if I had bought the license and XF was trash we wouldn't be moving to it.
Also would like to point out that it's because community feedback was actually listened to that this decision was made. Yop was about to pull the trigger on the Discourse move and if people (like Gabe) hadn't vocalised their concerns about it, we wouldn't have put the brakes on that. I don't think there's a single person who preferred the look of Discourse over XF, it's just that it was free.
Btw trying to get a big amount of community participation on the technical side of things is difficult, I put out an announcement about the XF beta and there still hasn't been a LOT of participation.
Also want to point out Discourse is so shit you all already forgot its actual name
Wait so are Mage and X referring to Discourse here instead of Discord? I was reading through and feeling quite confused, I know I've been absent a while but I was wondering when I'd missed talk of moving entirely to Discord, which was kinda blowing my mind as to why it had been considered.
In general I'm still a bit confused as to why so much thought and work was put into Discourse and progress was slow and then XF was put forth, Discourse abandoned, and XF progress went so quickly. I think it's awesome that there's progress being made and it seems like a move is imminent now but it feels like a big 180 from before and I'm just puzzled what happened to make it so. Then again I confess as to not reading every post in this thread so I'm likely just being stupid and these questions are already answered
What Gabe said is true but another factor is that Flint leaving motivated me to do more work. I had difficulties working with Discourse and found the XF backend much easier to work with, then spent one weekend and every night after work for 3-4 days learning XF and creating the default theme.
It's not that "suddenly this is all happening" it's that this discussion/ argument has been ongoing forever and as has been said for a long time we need to get off vB3 with far more urgency than we've been exhibiting here. I think it was Tres who said something like "I might really like the ship, but if the ship is sinking, we take the lifeboat" way back when this all began.
I don't want anyone to think community feedback isn't taken on board, I also understand there are jitters about moving to new forum software. This place has looked like this for nearly 10 years and it's been home for almost 10 years to a lot of us. It's a big change. I myself am nervous about it. But the truth is we have to move, and it was determined a long time ago that XF is the best option for maintaining as close as possible the look and feel of TLS while adding modern options, a good built in mobile browsing experience and actual security.
The move to XF is going to be a challenge just based on the fact we're transferring a decade worth of posts and custom permissions. It's not going to be 100% perfect right away, but an ongoing project. Community input is key and there'll never be a time you hear me say otherwise.
Honestly the short answer to "why is this all happening so suddenly" is that I got to work on XF as soon as Yop installed it and didn't stop until it was finished. We've all talked this to death and it's time we take action. We could have moved last weekend but I wanted more community input and we still need to set an actual date anyway. But it's also pointless to beta it for another year when it's sitting there basically ready to go. A lot of issues we aren't going to actually know about or resolve until it's being fully utilised by the members as TLS normally is. I put out an announcement about the beta and Yop has also been pushing on Discord to get people involved but we haven't discovered any problem we didn't know about before (board permissions and the user ladder permissions being the biggest so far, but those can't really be fixed prior to the move, which is why I suggested flattening the user titles prior to the move to make it easier).
Obsidian Fire
Ahk Morn!
- AKA
- The Engineer
I'll just put it this way... my reaction to Discourse was "Where did all the stuff that we use all the time go?" (mainly BBC Code) and "can that be fixed". Coupled with "BBC Code being broken makes the 10+ years worth of imported posts look like shit". The learning curve from vB to Discourse would have ended up being crazy. Like, "relearn how to format posts from scratch" crazy.
My reaction to Xf was "everything mostly works" and "all the previous posts look passable". Followed up with "can we move to this soon?". Yeah, there will be a learning curve, but said learning curve looks like it will be more along the lines of "no more in-line spoilers" and "sweet! We now have dedicated buttons to this BBC Code" and "new layout to learn" which happens every time I sign up for a forum.
Finding out that staff wanted to go to a forum that felt broken right from the get-go was a tad alarming. So people let staff know that and started putting forth other options that hopefully would feel less broken. Xf feels like it can be TLS's new home once everyone starts posting lots over there. At the very least, the majority of our posting habits won't have to change (hiding images behind spoilers, quotes of quotes, emote craziness, etc.). They would have had to with Discourse.
My reaction to Xf was "everything mostly works" and "all the previous posts look passable". Followed up with "can we move to this soon?". Yeah, there will be a learning curve, but said learning curve looks like it will be more along the lines of "no more in-line spoilers" and "sweet! We now have dedicated buttons to this BBC Code" and "new layout to learn" which happens every time I sign up for a forum.
Finding out that staff wanted to go to a forum that felt broken right from the get-go was a tad alarming. So people let staff know that and started putting forth other options that hopefully would feel less broken. Xf feels like it can be TLS's new home once everyone starts posting lots over there. At the very least, the majority of our posting habits won't have to change (hiding images behind spoilers, quotes of quotes, emote craziness, etc.). They would have had to with Discourse.
InterfaceLeader
Pro Adventurer
Thank you to the people who've put the money and time into XF to make it happen so quickly. Having tried to use TLS on my phone over the weekend, I was sharply reminded of (one of) the many good reasons to move asap. 
Mage
She/They
- AKA
- Mage
Okay I loathe TL;DR posts (I literally don't have the attention span to read them personally but I know a few people like them) but in this case I feel it warrants an exception.
Firstly, take the cunt hat off; I wear it better than any of you bastards. Secondly, pay attention because I've put a lot of effort into scribing this post and if anything isn't clear by the end of it then IDK what more I can do.
You have basically just expanded on your original comment. My follow-on point which I'd hoped would clarify matters was that by having Staff Emeritus visible based on your explanation is that you're putting an onus on former staffers that shouldn't be there. You're also overlooking outliers like myself who chose not to display the badge. You didn't explain that bit. People leave staff for various reasons, principally because they don't want the responsibility of the post any more. Expecting someone to be available in the same sense as a staffer (admittedly without the relevant permissions) even though they're not is unreasonable.
Right I'm going to hopefully address all of this below all the quotes because clearly an expansion on my last post (as quoted below) is needed.
Actually it did not. Again see below all the individual replies.
No-one asked me to expand the point, Tres asked if it was one of two things and I replied 'Both'.
Gonna refer you to the text underneath all the replies again and also add that I've been mixing up Discourse and Discord for aeons now.
We have always operated on community consensus unless something has been time-critical.
Also has it not occurred to anyone here that as I said before, people are hesitant to reply because they're afraid of being shot down in flames or made to look like they're being unreasonable? I've had a fair few PMs and messages on Facebook in my time here for making an unpopular post and being lambasted for it by people thanking me for having the front to say it (and seriously if you're going to do that I'd much rather you post in here kthxbai).
To a degree I agree, as I stated above but this has rumbled on for two years and Discord was decided upon very quickly.....and then nothing happened.
Also people have been engaging, Shad didn't like XF or Discord:
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785736&postcount=187
I didn't like Discord and the bottom of this post illustrates what I was driving at: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=786064&postcount=202
I mean I'd have been happy to expand on that point there and then and negate all this but no-one bothered asking because a handful of people were wanking over XF already.
No, there wasn't really much discussion, I've re-read the whole fucking thread to verify this and Yop clearly says on the first page that he was going to chuck up a couple of different test servers and we got Discourse and fuck all else. https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=766741&postcount=102
Not having a go at Yop but just making clear that that's what happened. Also this: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=719118&postcount=34
So we can't rush but fanny about for two years with a test server that was by all accounts excruciatingly painful to use, then get one up and running in three weeks. Oh-kay.
I appreciate that, but this thread has had a lot of going round and around and TBH it's off-putting.
Highlighted Flare's words for emphasis. This saga is literally so TL;DR now that people are losing track/zoning out/giving no fucks.
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785574&postcount=179
Nah, it's sudden, you don't from two years of conjecture to four weeks from chunter to beta and not call it sudden.
And possible obsoletion: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785685&postcount=183
Yes I have and I'll expand on it a bit more, though to be fair I did a fairly thorough assessment of Discourse and only Yop commented on it.
I don't have a problem with XF per se, I'm taking issue with the whole process of choosing new software and the ensuing discussion. I honestly thought this would have been broached already, especially since IIRC I've seen Gabe say that forum software options are limited and Lucis suggested phpBB when we discussed (collective 'we' there because serious lack of input) abandoning Discourse: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=786055&postcount=201
There was a bit of waffle around XF pros and cons and X posted this:
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785786&postcount=193
Which pretty much turned it into a two-horse race after Lex dismissed vB5 and identified XF as VB3's spiritual successor if you will.
I've had a play with XF and not managed to bork anything yet, I like how it looks and it's got lots of neat customisable options. So we can set that aside now because it's not XF that's the problem.
So, the last post I made outlined how I'd imagined the upgrade to pan out in line with using the consensus of the active member base. Right back at the start of the thread the options were identified as:
-Discourse
-XF
-phpBB
-Flarum
-Simple Machines
-Vanilla.
Only Discourse ever made it to the test stage. Not really sure how we're going to make a fair assessment of options when only one is presented TBH. Asides from that, there were six options given not counting vB but it overlooked:
-MyBB
-bbPress
-Invision
-FluxBB
-PunBB
-Phorum
-EsoTalk
-GNU
-WoltLab
-YaBB
-Discuz
-Zendesk
Fuck it, here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Internet_forum_software
Okay I accept that a lot of those are going to look/operate in similar styles or that we've already used them in previous forum incarnations but it would've been nice if they'd been mooted to start with. There's a fair bit more than six options (gonna accept now that some of those listed may not have existed in 2016 but they sure as hell did when we decided to abandon Discourse).
To compare it, I was looking at donor platforms that we might be able to utilise. I looked at over twenty different sites and narrowed it down to two and a WordPress plugin. It took me an evening and I passed my findings on to Yop. I wouldn't have minded at all taking time out to do something like this but I've offered my time on no less than three occasions where this has been concerned and no-one's come back to me.
I actually didn't bother posting in here for some time because I didn't have any technical knowledge but it rumbled on for a whole fucking year and nothing happened. There was even talk about getting the Discourse forum up and running in case anything Remake-related dropped at E3 (lol) but still nothing happened. Flint said back in April that he'd done as much as he was going to do so unless there was discussion away from this thread, I'm not sure what the delay was insofar with styling Discourse.
So in summary, I'm fine with XF and that's how we're going to move forward now AFAICT so whether I liked it or not that's that.
What I'm annoyed about is that we decided to abandon Discourse and didn't even bother doing the analysis that should've been done the first time around and wasn't. I even mentioned restarting the process and doing it differently to before. That same post was even thanked by some of the people who've been vocal about my last post.
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=786064&postcount=202
So it feels like XF was chosen by a few people rather than having a fair look at all of the available options. I'm not grousing because it's been quick (honestly after two years that was kinda nice), or that I was expecting someone to ask me personally if I was fine with it, but simply because what I expected from the opening posts of this thread was never delivered to start with.
Now jesus fuck if that isn't clear enough then I should take a vow of silence or something. Lolno.
Now if you'll excuse me it's taken me two hours to compile this reply which is far more of my evening than I wanted to commit (it's 1.50am here), I'm going to do my rounds and bugger off to bed.
Firstly, take the cunt hat off; I wear it better than any of you bastards. Secondly, pay attention because I've put a lot of effort into scribing this post and if anything isn't clear by the end of it then IDK what more I can do.
You have basically just expanded on your original comment. My follow-on point which I'd hoped would clarify matters was that by having Staff Emeritus visible based on your explanation is that you're putting an onus on former staffers that shouldn't be there. You're also overlooking outliers like myself who chose not to display the badge. You didn't explain that bit. People leave staff for various reasons, principally because they don't want the responsibility of the post any more. Expecting someone to be available in the same sense as a staffer (admittedly without the relevant permissions) even though they're not is unreasonable.
X said:Also, the reason that things moved quickly is that we basically reached a point where we wanted to push into using Discord – we got feedback that it was shit and folk didn't like it. There was quite a bit of hesitation around doing it. We pushed back into looking through the extant options again, and because of previous conversations higher versions of vB were heavily weighed against despite being easy, and XF still felt like the current boards, and everyone with misgivings about Discord had none about XF. Additionally, XF looked technically easier to achieve.
I feel that we're all kind of tired of having this migration having sat about in various stages of development hell, so when the clear answer was to give XF a go, and the test forum went through exceptionally smoothly, it seemed like a no-brainer. If Discord was at all this straightforward, we'd've likely moved already, but thankfully it wasn't so that we found ourselves a better option.
It's not like the staff are unilaterally making decisions without the input of the forum, or things'd've been forced over to Discord regardless of the misgivings of other members when it was brought up. The whole conversation happened at all, because folks felt (rightly) that that move'd be a bit shit, and with XF looking miles better, it's able to be done in relatively short order. Is your issue with actually moving to XF, that it seems to be going (too) quickly, or what? Also, what's the actual NEGATIVE of how quickly this transition's been taking place if so? For once it feels like we've actually all got our shit together towards getting a much-needed upgrade actually happening, so I'm genuinely baffled at all this.
X
Right I'm going to hopefully address all of this below all the quotes because clearly an expansion on my last post (as quoted below) is needed.
Actually it did not. Again see below all the individual replies.
No-one asked me to expand the point, Tres asked if it was one of two things and I replied 'Both'.
Gabe said:Furthermore what other choice is there? Discourse is trash, vB5 is not that great and like all of the other alternatives are like free software that has been on life support since 2006. It's not like we have many options to present the community here.
If this was just the staff saying no u without the help of the community chiming in. Sure I would see what you mean about staff just taking their own way, but that couldn't be further than the truth. Even before the public beta test there was still like 20 of the community members testing it behind closed doors. If that doesn't scream community acceptance I don't know what does.
Also want to point out Discourse is so shit you all already forgot its actual name
Gonna refer you to the text underneath all the replies again and also add that I've been mixing up Discourse and Discord for aeons now.
We have always operated on community consensus unless something has been time-critical.
Also has it not occurred to anyone here that as I said before, people are hesitant to reply because they're afraid of being shot down in flames or made to look like they're being unreasonable? I've had a fair few PMs and messages on Facebook in my time here for making an unpopular post and being lambasted for it by people thanking me for having the front to say it (and seriously if you're going to do that I'd much rather you post in here kthxbai).
To a degree I agree, as I stated above but this has rumbled on for two years and Discord was decided upon very quickly.....and then nothing happened.
Also people have been engaging, Shad didn't like XF or Discord:
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785736&postcount=187
I didn't like Discord and the bottom of this post illustrates what I was driving at: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=786064&postcount=202
I mean I'd have been happy to expand on that point there and then and negate all this but no-one bothered asking because a handful of people were wanking over XF already.
No, there wasn't really much discussion, I've re-read the whole fucking thread to verify this and Yop clearly says on the first page that he was going to chuck up a couple of different test servers and we got Discourse and fuck all else. https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=766741&postcount=102
Not having a go at Yop but just making clear that that's what happened. Also this: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=719118&postcount=34
So we can't rush but fanny about for two years with a test server that was by all accounts excruciatingly painful to use, then get one up and running in three weeks. Oh-kay.
Lex said:
I appreciate that, but this thread has had a lot of going round and around and TBH it's off-putting.
Also want to point out Discourse is so shit you all already forgot its actual name
Wait so are Mage and X referring to Discourse here instead of Discord? I was reading through and feeling quite confused, I know I've been absent a while but I was wondering when I'd missed talk of moving entirely to Discord, which was kinda blowing my mind as to why it had been considered.
In general I'm still a bit confused as to why so much thought and work was put into Discourse and progress was slow and then XF was put forth, Discourse abandoned, and XF progress went so quickly. I think it's awesome that there's progress being made and it seems like a move is imminent now but it feels like a big 180 from before and I'm just puzzled what happened to make it so. Then again I confess as to not reading every post in this thread so I'm likely just being stupid and these questions are already answered
Highlighted Flare's words for emphasis. This saga is literally so TL;DR now that people are losing track/zoning out/giving no fucks.
Lex said:
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785574&postcount=179
Nah, it's sudden, you don't from two years of conjecture to four weeks from chunter to beta and not call it sudden.
Lex said:
And possible obsoletion: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785685&postcount=183
Lex said:
Yes I have and I'll expand on it a bit more, though to be fair I did a fairly thorough assessment of Discourse and only Yop commented on it.
I don't have a problem with XF per se, I'm taking issue with the whole process of choosing new software and the ensuing discussion. I honestly thought this would have been broached already, especially since IIRC I've seen Gabe say that forum software options are limited and Lucis suggested phpBB when we discussed (collective 'we' there because serious lack of input) abandoning Discourse: https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=786055&postcount=201
There was a bit of waffle around XF pros and cons and X posted this:
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=785786&postcount=193
Which pretty much turned it into a two-horse race after Lex dismissed vB5 and identified XF as VB3's spiritual successor if you will.
I've had a play with XF and not managed to bork anything yet, I like how it looks and it's got lots of neat customisable options. So we can set that aside now because it's not XF that's the problem.
So, the last post I made outlined how I'd imagined the upgrade to pan out in line with using the consensus of the active member base. Right back at the start of the thread the options were identified as:
-Discourse
-XF
-phpBB
-Flarum
-Simple Machines
-Vanilla.
Only Discourse ever made it to the test stage. Not really sure how we're going to make a fair assessment of options when only one is presented TBH. Asides from that, there were six options given not counting vB but it overlooked:
-MyBB
-bbPress
-Invision
-FluxBB
-PunBB
-Phorum
-EsoTalk
-GNU
-WoltLab
-YaBB
-Discuz
-Zendesk
Fuck it, here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Internet_forum_software
Okay I accept that a lot of those are going to look/operate in similar styles or that we've already used them in previous forum incarnations but it would've been nice if they'd been mooted to start with. There's a fair bit more than six options (gonna accept now that some of those listed may not have existed in 2016 but they sure as hell did when we decided to abandon Discourse).
To compare it, I was looking at donor platforms that we might be able to utilise. I looked at over twenty different sites and narrowed it down to two and a WordPress plugin. It took me an evening and I passed my findings on to Yop. I wouldn't have minded at all taking time out to do something like this but I've offered my time on no less than three occasions where this has been concerned and no-one's come back to me.
I actually didn't bother posting in here for some time because I didn't have any technical knowledge but it rumbled on for a whole fucking year and nothing happened. There was even talk about getting the Discourse forum up and running in case anything Remake-related dropped at E3 (lol) but still nothing happened. Flint said back in April that he'd done as much as he was going to do so unless there was discussion away from this thread, I'm not sure what the delay was insofar with styling Discourse.
So in summary, I'm fine with XF and that's how we're going to move forward now AFAICT so whether I liked it or not that's that.
What I'm annoyed about is that we decided to abandon Discourse and didn't even bother doing the analysis that should've been done the first time around and wasn't. I even mentioned restarting the process and doing it differently to before. That same post was even thanked by some of the people who've been vocal about my last post.
https://thelifestream.net/forums/showpost.php?p=786064&postcount=202
So it feels like XF was chosen by a few people rather than having a fair look at all of the available options. I'm not grousing because it's been quick (honestly after two years that was kinda nice), or that I was expecting someone to ask me personally if I was fine with it, but simply because what I expected from the opening posts of this thread was never delivered to start with.
Now jesus fuck if that isn't clear enough then I should take a vow of silence or something. Lolno.
Now if you'll excuse me it's taken me two hours to compile this reply which is far more of my evening than I wanted to commit (it's 1.50am here), I'm going to do my rounds and bugger off to bed.
- Status